
Class _"PS3-^-|-S' 
Book, , T7^t(,6 

COPYRIGHT DEPOSIT. 



UNCLE STEPHEN 
AND OTHER VERSES 



UNCLE STEPHEN 

BY 

AMOS LUNT HINDS 




PRIVATELY PRINTED AT 

1905 



LIBRARY of CONGRESS 
Two Copies Received 

DEC 19 1905 

Copyright Entry 
CLASS ex. XXc, No. 

/3 3 ^?7 

COPY B. 






COPYRIGHT 1905 BY AMOS LUNT HINDS 



^ The verses in this little volume have 

A been written at various times during the 
^ last forty years. Some of them have ap- 

^ peared in " Scribner's Monthly," " The 
^- Independent," *'New York Tribune," 

J ''Golden Rule," "Portland Advertiser," 

^ ''Maine Farmer," "Waterville Mail," 

and other Maine journals. They are 
published at the suggestion and request 
of old friends, to whom they are sub- 
mitted with affectionate greeting. 

A. L. H. 
Benton Falls, Maine, 
November 12, 1905. 



CONTENTS 

A Working Creed .... 3 

Uncle Stephen .... 4 
The Song-Sparrow . . . .15 

The King-Cup's Test ... 19 

Admonition ' ^3 

The First Stone .... 25 

In Memory 28 

The Old Block House . . 30 

The Heart's Prophecy ... 37 

An Album Verse .... 38 

The Soldiers' Monument . . 39 

Character and Repute . . 42 

An Old Fife 43 

The Point of View ... 47 

Planting Trees 48 

November 53 

Katahdin 55 

Cornelia 58 



viii Contents 

Through Toil . 

Hans Christian Andersen 

Grandmother Reed 

A Choice .... 

Consolation . 

The Reply .... 

Memorial Day . 

Now 

One Answer 

The Warder . 

A Fire of Apple Wood . 

In Tenebris 

Unexpected Guests . 

Finis 



60 
62 

65 
67 
71 
74 
76 
78 
80 
83 
85 
92 

93 
95 



UNCLE STEPHEN 
AND OTHER VERSES 




A WORKING CREED 

EEP life serene. 
Toil steadfastly, 
Nobility 
In mind and mien. 

Let fall the seed ; 
How it shall fare, 
With fevered heed 
Ask not ; that care 
Should burden thee 
Than plant and tree 
No more. God's love 
Doth constant prove. 
Bids blight or flower 
The harvest dower. 



UNCLE STEPHEN 

STORY, a story," says Golden 
Head, 
As she storms her father's 
knee; 
*' Not fairy, but some tender tale, 
And as true as true can be." 

" Well, daughter, lay these sunny curls 

Just here upon my breast. 
And round the dainty little form 

Let father's fond arms rest ; 
Then, while a purpling glory fills 

The restful even-tide. 
And far across the tuneful fields 

The lengthening shadows glide, 
I '11 tell of one who sleeps in peace 

These fifty years and more. 
Where yonder ancient oak-tree shades 



Uncle Stephen 5 

The bickering streamlet's shore. 
His neighbors called him * Uncle Ste- 
phen,' — 

A fond, familiar name — 
I notice oft with generous souls 

Men loving kinship claim. 

" You can't remember the year * sixteen,' 

" It passed so long ago ; 

They only do whose reverent heads 

Are white like falling snow. 
That year no fruitful summer came 

To bless the waiting land ; 
Somehow, the constant season missed 

Its Master's just command. 
For sixty years ago to-night, 

When June's soft breezes blow, 
There lay above the pallid hills 

A shroud of drifting snow. 
And o'er the wondering farmers' homes 

Fell fierce a swirling rout, 



6 Uncle Stephen 

As on those wild December nights 

When stormy winds are out. 
Thro' all the dismal morning hours, 

Across the whitening lands, 
Farmers had walked beside their plows 

With closely mittened hands. 
And chilling redbreasts hopped for food 

Where the furrow darkling lay, 
Till pitying plowmen stayed their teams, 

And lifted them away. 
And so, the dreary season through, 

Each month the hoarfrost fell, 
Till wintry autumn's wailing winds 

Moaned like a funeral knell. 
No happy songs of harvest home. 

Fierce winter at the door. 
Earless the stricken corn-fields stood, 

God help the friendless poor ! 
For those were days of pioneers ; 

Shut off from other lands. 
They had alone, in hours of need, 



Uncle Stephen y 

Their own stout hearts and hands. 
To-day, let summer suns refuse 

To grace with gleaming grain 
And ranks of golden-tasseled maize 

The rocky hills of Maine, 
And thrice ten thousand hearts, with 
ours 

In kindliest union wed, 
Thro* all the vast and fruitful West, 

Would fill the land with bread." 

" And Uncle Stephen .? " " Daughter, 
yes. 

We '11 make no more delay, 
When one has pleasant words to speak 

He loiters on the way. 
Beside yon stream, that thro' the years, 

With ever-murmuring wave. 
Sings to the wild anemones, 

Abloom above his grave. 
Just where the brook and river meet 



8 Uncle Stephen 

Beneath the pine-clad hill, 
Stood, in the century's early dawn. 

Good Uncle Stephen's mill. 
Where all the cheery summer days. 

With dreamy, slumbrous sound. 
Grinding the corn from far and near, 

His rumbling stones went round. 
It may not be the miller had 

A poet's heart and brain. 
That unseen music filled the air, 

The while he ground his grain. 
Perchance his dull ears never heard. 

On summer evenings lone. 
Beneath the river's babbling flow. 

Its mystic undertone. 
Or, musing thro' the silent noons. 

Untouched by toil or care, 
He never heard the harvest fly 

Shrill thro' the shimmering air, 
Or saw beneath his sleeping mere. 

The mirrored pine-trees through. 



Uncle Stephen g 

Far fleets of snowy summer cloud 

Go sailing down the blue. 
Yet they who read aright the page 

Of years, dark-lined with wrong, 
Can see in Uncle Stephen's life 

A most ethereal song, 
The rhythmic beauty of good deeds ; 

Since never from his door 
Unpitied or unaided went 

One of God's homeless poor. 
Amid life's ills his bounteous heart 

A thousand ways was tested, 
Till o'er his humble home it seemed 

A rainbow's arch had rested ; 
And on the darkest winter day. 

About the little mill, 
Brooded the charm of sweet content, 

The sunshine of good-will. 

" But when, 'mid years with plenty 
crowned, 



10 Uncle Stephen 

The famed * cold season ' came, 
Then all the fires within his soul 

Burst into cheeriest flame. 
From many a distant country-side, 

Seeking for corn in store, 
The rich and shrewd, on weary quest, 

Drew rein beside his door. 

* To purchase corn for daily needs 

We find no trifling task ; 
Sell us your grain, we '11 make no 
terms, 
But pay you what you ask.' 

* Nay, nay,' the sturdy miller said, 

* I must not sell to you ; 
The money in your well-filled purse 

Hath power to help you through ; 
I keep my corn for those who have 

No money left to pay ; 
I '11 trust them in their hour of 
need, 

And bide the time they may.' 



Uncle Stephen 1 1 

" Their struggling mother left behind, 

The father gone before, 
One day two little orphans stood 

Beside the river's shore. 
Bearing within their slender arms 

Some scanty store of corn. 
Gleaned with as sad a heart as 
Ruth's 

In Judah's fields, forlorn ; 
And, as was wont, their small halloo 

They sent across the tide. 
Till Uncle Stephen from his mill 

Their little forms espied, 
And loosing straight his log canoe 

Was quickly at their side. 
How soon the httle ones, at first 

Abashed, were at their ease ! 
For Uncle Stephen, gray and old, 

Had deftest power to please. 
The bounty in his welcome smile, 

His genial, child-like way. 



12 Uncle Stephen 

Their orphaned hearts Uke sunhght 
cheered 

The Hvelong summer day. 
And when the lingering solstice sun 

Shone like a far gold dome, 
With words of cheer to bear along, 

He sent them, happy, home. 

" That evening, as the weary dame 
Drew forth her precious store. 

The chest, that held the corn she sent, 
Was brimming o'er and o'er. 

* Gramercy, children, how is this ! ' 

The dazed good-wife did say, 

* Has Uncle Stephen failed to toll 

Our little grist to-day } ' 

* Oh, yes, indeed, he tolled the grist,* 

The guileless orphan said, 

* For, resting his brown, wrinkled 

hand 
On little brother's head, 



Uncle Stephen i^ 

While just the faintest, queerest smile 

Played round his quivering lip, 
I saw his heaping measure, thrice, 

From bin to hopper dip.* 
Then, with o'erflowing heart and eye, 

The mother knelt to pray. 
And many a swift God-bless-him sent 

Its tearful, tremulous way 
To where, above these mists of time, 

Heaven's mystic uplands lay. 
Oh well for him whose whispered name, 

Breathed forth 'mid grateful tears. 
Like some sweet note in music meets 

God's ever-listening ears ! 

" Between the Hues, O Golden Head ! 

Your musing father reads 
This lesson clear, that generous souls 

And tender, loving deeds. 
In this self-seeking world of ours, 

Are what the Master needs : 



14 Uncle Stephen \ 

That, would we have Ufe's closing hours ; 

With peaceful glory kissed, ■ 

Like those white clouds that sleeping lie ] 

'Mid rosy amethyst, ! 

We should remember as we live \ 

How the good man ground his grist." 




THE SONG-SPARROW 

OME days from June, like 
merry-hearted girls, 
Strayed through the fields of 
March, 
Sang tuneful songs, and flaunted golden 
curls. 
The wild and stormy arch 
Of heaven forgot to frown 
On field and woodland brown ; 
And like a giant, surly and uncouth. 
Subdued to tenderness by love and youth, 
Reflecting down the light from joy-lit 

maiden eyes, 
Filled all the fields of air with the blue 
of summer skies. 

The larch and maple felt the cold blood 
stir 



i6 The Song-Sparrow 

Along their frozen veins ; 

And 'neath the mossy groves of fra- 
grant fir 
The arbute of the plains, 

Like some pure sleeper taken by sur- 
prise, 

Just oped the lids of her sweet wonder- 
ing eyes. 

The streamlet, wakened from its frozen 
sleep, 

Dashed murm'ring downward o'er the 
rocky steep. 

And with the music of its deep-toned lyre 

Chimed in the treble of the feathered 
choir. 

The mood was transient ; from the fro- 
zen sand 
Of storm-swept Hudson Bay 

A northern simoon, surging down the 
land, 



The Song-Sparrow 1 7 

Rushed o'er the smiHng day ; 
'Mid swirling snow and bitter bhnding 

rain, 
Lapsed all the scene to savagery again. 

Then from my study window looking 

forth 
Upon the raging storm, 
The wintry currents breasting from 

the north, 
I spied a tiny form, — 
A sparrow, wresting in its bitter need 
A frugal meal from off a wind-swung 

reed ; 
And soon as ever it had broke its fast, 
Lo ! through the pauses of the howling 

blast 
A liquid song of thanks rose clear and 

high 
Through all the tumult of the wintry 

sky; 



1 8 The Song' Sparrow 

Above the stars I have no doubt God 

heard 
The heartfelt offering of his little bird. 

'Twere nothing strange, with all the 

air in tune 
And fragrant with the violets of June, 

That any bird should sing, 
That through the lapses of still summer 

eves. 
Amid the canopies of rustling leaves. 
With song should fold its wing. 
But that sweet hymn through bleak and 

wintry skies 
Uprising dims with tearful mist mine 
eyes, 
Touches within the soul a chord 
Like some deep utterance of the 

Lord, 
As if across the restless sea 
Were heard the voice from Galilee. 




THE KING-CUP'S TEST 

Y lips seemed swift enough 
with words, 
'Mid schoolmates' song and 
story, 
That, ever as her sweet face came, 

Lost all their wonted glory. 
Some glamour in the deep blue eye — 

Love's nameless, tender token — 
Drew close the golden gates of speech 
And left the word unspoken. 

Till one rare morning, when the year 
Was gay with leafy banners, 

And Nature's tuneful troubadours 
Were singing blithe hosannas. 

When every sound was in the air 
The sweet-voiced spring could utter, 



20 The King-Cup's Test 

She plucked a king-cup from the hedge, 
To see if I Hked butter. 

A golden chalice, closed in snow, 

The blue eyes peering under — 
E'en now, in sober middle-age, 

I find no room for wonder 
That, when youth's happy vintage bore 

Its bubble-beaded wine, 
The peerless vestal's pensive face 

Seemed more than half divine. 

Dear guileless girl ! She clearly meant 

The golden fruit of dairy ; 
I heard alone the pronoun sweet 

That stood for winsome Mary. 
And while the swift impetuous tides 

Set all life's valves a-flutter. 
The cooler brain found strength to 
say 

My fond heart did love but her. 



77?^ King-Cup's Test 21 

"Your heart — your heart — I meant 
— I meant " — 

The tell-tale blood came flushing, 
Fair as above the morning hills 

The rosy dawn lay blushing. 
So erst the Teucrian shepherd boy, 

Some mountain path pursuing 
Plucked, lily-like, life's crowning joy, 

His sweet CEnone wooing. 

Adrift upon the tide of years — 

The mystic, murmuring river — 
Sometimes we see the sunlight play. 

The cypress starlit ever ; 
And always up the singing stream 

One fair dawn gleams afar, 
Touched with the rose of early day 

Beneath the morning star. 

And if at times, in sportive mood, 
She holds the king-cup under, 



22 The King-Cups Test 

Demure as when she broke the spell 
That held our lives asunder, 

Be very sure a glad heart bids 
The fond lips more than utter 

How through the lapse of happy years 
Her old-time love loves but her. 



ADMONITION 

OW wrought I yesterday ? " 
Small moment now, 
To question with vain tears 
or bitter moan, 
Since every word you wrote upon the 
sands 
Of yesterday hath hardened into 
stone. 

" How work to-morrow ? " 'T is a day 
unborn. 
To scan whose formless features is 
not granted ; 
Ere the new morning dawns, soul, thou 
may'st wing 
Thy flight beyond to-morrows, disen- 
chanted ! 



24 Admonition 

" How shall I work to-day ? " O soul 
of mine ! 
To-day stands on the threshold, girt 
to lead 
Thy feet to life immortal ; strive with 
fear ; 
Deep pit-falls strew the way ; take 
heed — take heed ! 



THE FIRST STONE 



O sacred legend of the Nazarene 
Makes glad with tenderer touch 
The heart oppressed by sin, 
Or comes to plead with such 
Sweet eloquence to win, 
As that rare passage where the Mag- 
dalen, 
By subtle scribe and Pharisee accused, 
Stands in the Master's presence all con- 
fused. 
With strange unwonted tears her down- 
cast eyes suffused. 

As silently the eastern morning steals 
Across Chaldea's plain, 
Within the stately walls 
Of ancient Salem's fane 
The chastened splendor falls : 



26 The First Stone 

All pomp of art its rosy gleam re- 
veals, 

All grace and strength the elder world 
hath found, 

And 'mid a throng entranced in hush 
profound, 

The form of One who stoops and writes 
upon the ground. 

How vauntingly those Scribes and Phar- 
isees, 
Long-robed, displayed their broad phy- 
lacteries ! 
How swift and sure to name 
With cruel jibes and jeers 
The fallen woman's shame ! 
How clear upon their ears 
Fell those swift words of flame 
That every pulse did stir ! 
** Let him that hath no blame 
The first stone cast at her." 



The First Stone 2j 

And each, convicted by accusing wrong, 
Leaves, as he steals the corridors along. 
The Magdalen, the Master, and the 
silent throng. 

Then from his musing posture Christ 

uprose ; 
The crowning sequel every sad heart 
knows. 
Full many a burdened soul. 
As time's slow ages roll. 
Like her of ancient years. 
Seeking to touch with tears 
His garment's heahng hem, 
Doth hear him calmly say, 
"O woman, where are they 
That did accuse thee sore ? 
Neither do I condemn ; 
Go thou and sin no more." 



IN MEMORY 

Captain William T. Parker fell at Spottsylvania, 
May 19, 1864. 



IS forty years to-day since my 

young friend 
(How at the thought of him 
sweet memories rise 
That move the heart and dim with mist 

the eyes !) 
Gave his white Hfe, a blameless sacri- 
fice, 
Upon thy stricken field of sad re- 
nown, 

O Spottsylvania ! 
One of the dauntless heroes that went 

down 
Before the cannon's breath on that 
dread day. 



In Memory 2g 

I have not found along the track of 

years, 
Since that far hour when we shook 

hands to part, 
A man more true, chivalric, pure in 

heart. 
Or one that Hved from meanness more 

apart. 
Rich in all sacred instincts men revere. 
Alas ! that from high aims and duties 

here. 
And fond companionships, Heaven early 

called ! 
Since earth is poor, and rich the boun- 
teous skies 
In loyal souls — but God sees otherwise I 

Benton Falls, Maine, 
May 19, 1904. 



THE OLD BLOCK HOUSE 



HERE the wedded rivers mingle, 
Murmuring down a broader 
way, 
Past fair cities, seaward singing. 

Stands the block-house old and gray, 

Built amid the woods primeval — 
Iron pathways at its feet — 

Like some lonely watcher musing 
Where the night and morning meet. 

Not of Indian wars or gory 
Massacres its gray walls tell ; 

Never hath some Church or Standish 
Told his children what befell. 

When the wily savage, stealing 

Through the dusk the pine woods 
made. 



The Old Block House 31 

Smote the widowed wife and mother 
Childless to its palisade. 

Saxon strength, art, and endurance 
Overmatched the feebler breed ; 

Mount Hope's sachem strove no longer 
With the heir of Runnymede, 

When Maine's primal forests echoed 
With the strokes of Shirley's axe, 

And his hardy workmen builded 
The quaint walls of Halifax. 

Yet, O Hchened structure, surely 
He who listens finely hears 

Tales that well are worth the telling. 
Whispered through the phantom 
years. 

Thou art built of pines whose needles 
Trembled in Ticonic's roar. 



^2 The Old Block House 

Ere the boy Columbus sported 
In the old streets of Genoa. 

Musing by thy storm- worn portal 
Sets the fancy free to stand, 

Lonely, as an Indian hunter 
In his strange primeval land. 

Fades the garrulous, teeming present, 
Stilled yon stately mills of use — 

What is this that parts the coppice } 
' T is the weird form of the moose. 

In the pine-wood mighty voices — 
List, the fitting interludes — 

* T is the wild fowl madly sporting 
'Mid their plashy solitudes. 

Dim across the ancient river, 

Shadowed deep with forests high. 

Like some pallid wraith or spectre, 
See, a silent birch glides by. 



The Old Block House ^^ 

And above, where surging waters 
Wake with might a deep-toned lyre, 

Lo, some wandering brave, benighted, 
Lights his lonely bivouac fire. 

He shall hear thy flood, Ticonic, 
Rushing fetterless and free. 

And shall break his fast to-morrow 
By the sailless summer sea ; 

Count his days of journeying over 
By the waning moon that smiles 

O'er the gleaming coves and reaches, 
Strewn with Casco's wooded isles. 

This is nature's vast cathedral, 
Forest-aisled from deep to deep ; 

Never comes the image-breaker ; 

Here the dead mound-builders sleep. 

Never in the morning's ofling. 

Westering with the landward breeze. 



^4 The Old Block House 

Keel of daring navigator 

Parts the strange and lonely seas. 

Little recks the child of nature 

Dreams that haunt the school-man's 
brain, 

Vows of hooded monk and friar, 
Or the schemes of Charlemagne. 

" Never comes the image-breaker } " 
Hark, a deep and smothered sound 

Rushes through the wood's dim arches, 
Creeps along the trembling ground. 

'T is the axe of pioneer, 

And an era new is born ; 
See, the clearing's smoke floats skyward, 

Through the still October morn. 

Ere long, Arnold's restless spirit, 
While his blazoned banners fleck 



The Old Block House ^5 

The lone river's silent reaches, 
Seeks the siege of far Quebec. 

And anon, on peaceful mission, 
As the glad day follows night, 

Learning's grave and meek disciples 
Bear the Master's love and light. 

So, when war's alarum leaveth 
Crimson plain and startled air, 

Nature's lulling rains of summer 
Set her fair white lilies there. 

Lo, against the evening's amber. 
Looms the factory's ponderous side. 

Brightly gleaming, many- windowed. 
As an argus hundred-eyed. 

And the sunset, slowly fading, 

Yields the weird night solemn rule. 

Gilds the spires of sleeping village 
And the walls of Chaplin's school, 



^6 The Old Block House 

Gilds the quaint and lichened ramparts 
Of the block-house old and gray, 

Lingering where the married rivers 
Croon their ancient roundelay. 




THE HEART'S PROPHECY 

Y friend drew near me unaware ; 
He brought sweet love, not 
harm ; 

And still my heart beat momently 
With strange and vague alarm. 
A startled throb — tho' when I turned, 

From my pale face, he said. 
The lilies vanished, and straightway 
Some roses bloomed instead. 

I blamed my heart that it should fall 

Prey to such groundless fears. 
It plead the stern necessity 

Of these sin-clouded years, 
But prophesied a happier scene, 

In peace and love complete. 
Where it would trust all messengers, 

And keep its rhythmic beat. 



AN ALBUM VERSE 



m 



SHEAF of happy years be 

thine to gather, 
Young Gleaner on life's har- 
vest plain ! 
A soul serene through storm and sunny 
weather 

Be thine to gain, 
Young Gleaner on life's harvest plain 1 



THE SOLDIERS' MONUMENT 

Lines read at the unveiling, Waterville, Maine, 
May 30, 1876. 



0-DAY, like incense, sweet ac- 
claim 
With tearful thought is wed, 
Where'er the mournful marbles name 
The nation's patriot dead. 

Above the land dark-glooming lay 

A starless night of shame. 
How like a glimpse of breaking day 

Their swift obedience came ! 

On many a lurid battle-field 

Austerely lost or won. 
They showed how manly virtues live 

From struggling sire to son. 



40 The Soldiers' Monument 

To "make the bounds of freedom 
wide " 
They gave their gallant lives ; 
Since brave Heath fell and Winthrop 
died 
Life's subtlest worth survives. 

The charm of letters, learning's light, 

Each tender ideal dream. 
Amid the pure transfiguring air 

With tenfold glory gleam. 

When with the lull of cannonade. 
War's fierce alarums cease, 

And o'er a nation's thousand hills 
Falls the hush of stainless peace. 

Long let this musing soldier stand 
'Neath free New England's skies, 

To all that love the fatherland. 
Type of self-sacrifice. 



The Soldiers' Monument ^/ 
And ever as fair Freedom's cause 

Brave new defenders needs, 
Chivalric souls for righteous laws 

Stand firm in faith and deeds, 

That when, once more, the passing 
years, 

Like birds upon the wing, 
Amid some May-time's smiles and tears. 

Shall reach a hundredth spring. 

Our children's children, wiser grown 
By all the years have taught. 

All civic virtue find their own. 
All crowning wealth of thought. 




CHARACTER AND REPUTE 

HARACTER and repute — 
Wraith and reality — 
Twin shapes but incomplete 

In true identity ; 

Somewhat of good and ill 

The balance shifting still. 

Then seek not, soul, to keep ' 

Thyself and history ' 

In perfect equipoise 

Here on this twilight brink 

Of life ; but live to be, 

In all great quality, I 

Far nobler than men think ! i 



AN OLD FIFE 

Among the relics in the State House at Augusta is 
an old fife bearing this inscription : " On this fife was 
played the Dead March at the execution of Major 
Andre." 



SHROUD shot thro' with gold, 

the while I mused, 
Sad memory wove among the 
curios here — 
Showed this dumb pipe austerely inter- 
fused 
With annals of a long-departed year — 
With passion-freighted deeds that 

stirred amain 
The fiery blood of patriots, and still 

burn 
Along our veins with scarce less urgent 

glow. 
As we renew old rapture and old pain, 



44 ^^ Old Fife 

Feel valor, triumph, scorn, of friend 
or foe — 

That backward-peering fancy can dis- 
cern. 

Draw near and read the faint, time- 
yellowing line 
Precisely traced along the fife's scarred 

side 
By one who loved such virtu as old 

wine: 
" This played the march when Major 

Andr6 died." 
But gaze beyond this grave memento 

cast. 
Like wandering waif on wave-deserted 

heights, 
Far thro' the gathering mist and read 
That tragedy of an heroic past — 
Feel the relentless pulse-beats of that 

breed 



An Old Fife 4^ 

Of sires who wrought, thus grimly, for 
their rights. 

Did heaven deep sapphire glow, or gloom 

a frown ? 
Were hushed the winds, or tuned in 

lofty psalm 
That far October day at Tappantown ? 
Ah, Nature's mood boots less — the 

Man was calm ! 
None calmer brooked, unblanched, the 

vast concourse 
Of troop and citizen ; none deeper 

breath 
O f incense drank from cool autumnal airs. 
Listing the shrilling of this pipe's thin 

voice 
As 't were for festival, that dirge of 

death — 
This peer of England's bravest cava- 
liers ! 



46 An Old Fife 

The solemn pageant faded long ago. 
The throes of other wars, 'mid civic 

strife 
Full fierce and century-long, have dulled 

the woe 
Of that old war which gave the nation 

Hfe. 
The fifer's lips are dust. All search is 

vain 
For aged chronicler who might recall 
The scene. The gallant foeman other 

ways 
Serves his great Leader otherwhere. 

Of all 
The vanished spectacle, this fife still 

stays — 
Could breathe that selfsame dead march 



THE POINT OF VIEW 



IS the fairest of all flowers — 
To the eye you must suppose ; 
To the heart it gives no more 
Than a scentless guelder-rose. 

*T is the plainest wayside bloom — 
To the eye you are to think; 

To the heart it brings the gift 
Of a sweet carnation-pink. 



PLANTING TREES 



LONG the quiet village street, 
Skirting a shadow-haunted 
way, 
Robust in bole and broad of arm, 
Great elms and maples bend and 
sway. 

They bring no fruit as corn or wine. 
They store with wealth no throbbing 
mart ; 

Their ministry is more divine. 
The culture of the human heart. 

When April suns have stirred their 
blood 
And May's warm breezes thrill the 
air. 



Planting Trees 4g 

What rich undress of golden bloom 
Those graceful elms and maples 
wear ! 

And when June, fair imperial month, 
The summer of the northern year. 
Leads in, and like some great-souled 
queen, 
Strews her large bounty far and 
near, 

What wondrous mantles quaint and 
rare. 
As sunbeams glance and soft winds 
blow. 
Those stately monarchs of the air 
Athwart their stalwart shoulders 
throw ! 

Through cool sweet depths of verdur- 
ous gloom 



^o Planting Trees 

A hundred song-birds flit and sing, 
Staid robins with their martial tunes, 
Gay orioles with tinted wing. 

How tenderly from drooping boughs 
Their dwellings, breeze-swung to and 
fro. 

Cradle the birds that still shall sing 
As endless summers come and go ! 

And when the artist Autumn comes 
To gild his gleaming wheat with 
gold. 
And stain with crimson dyes the 
hills 
That prop the azure-tinted wold, 

He lingers with his tenderest art, 
Till, 'neath the Indian summer skies, 

The street, with golden light aflame, 
Seems like some path in Paradise. 



Planting Trees 5/ 

And though the wizard Winter weaves 
O'er all the pallid country-side 

His spell, be jeweled by the mist 
And sun, they rise up glorified. 

And so the rolling seasons through, 
All souls that live with unclosed eyes 

In myriad modes of form and hue 
Find in these trees some new sur- 
prise. 

The hands that planted long ago 
Were folded on a silent breast, 

And with life 's ceaseless ebb and flow 
Sank into their eternal rest. 

And yet methinks the genial soul 
Who wrought that other lives might 
see 

In leaf and bloom and graceful form 
The stately beauty of the tree, 



52 Planting Trees 

Must feel, mayhap, a tender joy 
If from the skies he sometimes sees 

What grace the fair New England town 
Gains from the thoughtful planter's 
trees. 



NOVEMBER 

NCE from a russet oak, this 
autumn morn, 
A robin piped the song it 
loves in May ; 
And once a hermit, shy and far with- 
drawn, 
Trilled, happy heart, its sweet ethereal 
lay. 

Their silent mates, these finding voice 
to sing 
Amid the fading splendors of the 
hour, 
Could wrest no tuneful prophecy of 
spring 
From chill November sky and leaf- 
less bower. 



^4 November 

So, like the silent or the singing bird, 
When life's autumnal frosts their 
ravage bring, 
Shall we dwell voiceless, or our hearts 
be stirred 
To song prophetic of returning 
spring. 




KATAHDIN 

BRAWNY athlete, pitiless as 
fate ! 
The tireless wrestler with an 
aeon's storms ! 
A product of the years that antedate 
Earth's loveliness with weird and sav- 
age forms ! 

An anchorite, austere and gloomy- 
browed. 

Within the silence of a solemn wood 

Withdrawn ; who, cowled in mist, leans 
on his staff 

To hear the northern diver's weird wild 
laugh 

Across lone lakes resounding far and 
loud, 

Befitting well his stern, relentless mood. 



56 Katahdin 

And yet beside grim old Katahdin's 
feet, 

By many a beetling crag inclosed 
around, 

That bates the fierceness of the north 
wind's breath 

And lullabies the wild tornado's sound, 

A little lake, translucent, pure, and 
sweet. 

Lies sleeping on its cool white bed of 
sand, — 

The charm of life amid the reign of 
death. 

An alien beauty in a savage land. 

And all about its gleaming pebbly 
bed 

The blue-eyed mountain harebells fond- 
ly cling. 

And in the dark firs glooming overhead. 

Serenely trustful, sweet-voiced wild- 
birds sing. 



Katahdin 31 

Sometimes, perchance, within the stern- 
est breast, 

Whence fond confiding words no more 
outwell. 

Like hidden fires that slumber unex- 
pressed, 

The pure high thought and sweet 
emotion dwell. 




CORNELIA 

ECAUSE great souls than gold 
prize honor more, 
Because her sons were loyal 
to old Rome, 
Revered the gods, kept faith, and 
loved their home, 
Cornelia, mother of the Gracchi, wore 
As queenly gems the children that she 
bore. 
"These are my jewels." Lo, the 
famed reply. 
Winged for long flitting thro' each 
alien sky. 
Speeds, bird-like, past the threshold of 

her door ! 
O Saxon matron! great queen of the 
west ! 



Cornelia 5P 

Columbia! thine be the meed to 
say — 
Keeping the promise of thy peer- 
less youth — 
Cornelia-wise to every biding guest, 
"These are my praise, their feet do 
hold the way 
Of stainless honor, probity, and 
truth." 




THROUGH TOIL 

Per ardua ad astra ; per angusta ad augusta." 

HOLD it better far that one 
should rule 
Imperious temper with a sin- 
ewy will, 
Than amiable and passionless of soul, 
With folded hands amid life's din sit 
still 
For though ofttimes the battle goeth 
hard, 
Strength comes with struggle, and 
wild olive leaves. 
Twined round a brow begrimed and 

battle-scarred. 
Mean more to noble men and nobler 
gods 
Than costliest purples of inglorious 
ease. 



Through Toil 6i 

Though tired men, through toil-encum- 
bered years, 
Seek restful havens, lotus lands of 
dreams. 
Who that hath seen doth evermore for- 
get 
What glory o'er his burnished armor 
gleams. 
Who fights with grosser self, or crushes 
down 
With stalwart blows the vices of his 
age. 
Threading the austere heights of chaste 

renown ! 
The victor's joy. Fate nevermore re- 
veals 
To sluggish souls, nor his transcend- 
ent peace. 



HANS CHRISTIAN ANDERSEN 




NDER the sea from a distant 
strand 
Fleetly the mystic courier 
sped, 
Bearing the message from land to land, 
That Christian Andersen lies dead. 

And when the hush of the eventide 
Falls 'neath the far New England 
skies, 
And the summer landscape, dim and 
wide, 
In the tender gleam of the gloaming 
lies. 

The mother gleans for her little girl 
Tidings that come with the dying 
day, 



Hans Christian Andersen 63 

Foam-flakes that drift from the rush 
and whirl 
Of Hfe three thousand miles away. 

" And is he dead ? 't is so too bad ! " 
These were the words the little one 
said, 
And the tones of the voice were ten- 
derly sad 
For her darling dreamer lying dead, 

In the Danish town beyond the sea ; 

All quenched the mellow fancy's 
gleams. 
And hushed in voiceless mystery 

The dear romancer's golden dreams. 

But, little one, this is the sombre 
side 
Of the cloud that rests over human 
love, 



64 Hans Christian Andersen 

Whose low-lying mists do evermore 
hide 
The stars in the azure fields above. 
For the vanished life so loyal and true, 
That crossed yestreen the mystic 
tide, 
Hath somewhere found in the bound- 
less blue 
The happy home of the glorified. 

Oh, rich is the lot of the child-like soul, 
Whose years through devious chan- 
nels move. 
Yet touch serene life's utmost goal, 
Laureled with childhood's crowning 
love! 



GRANDMOTHER REED 




OME, Letty, sing ' The Rose of 
Annandale/ " 
Said Grandma, gray and old 
and blind, 
But young in heart, and crystal-clear 
in mind 
As in her happy girlhood far away. 
The loitering sea-breeze, rippling Casco 

Bay, 
Played with her silver hair that distant 
day. 
And fair Orr's Island smiled 'mid 

summer green. 
Grandma's dim eyes beheld the beau- 
teous scene 
No more, no more the island-studded 

sea; 
Yet patient, gentle, steadfastly serene. 



66 Grandmother Reed 

Smoothing the curls, would Grandma 

say to me < 

From out a summer life that did not 

I 

fail, j 

" Come, Letty, sing * The Rose of An- i 

nandale.' " j 

Dear loving Grandma, peaceful, long 

ago, 
She went beyond the blue tide's ebb 

and flow. 
Beyond the glint and gleam of snowy 

sail, , 

Into the realm of life's perpetual 

spring ; 
And, long ere this, has heard the 

angels sing 
A sweeter song than "The Rose of 

Annandale." 



A CHOICE 




Fsome divine intelligence should 
stand 
Beside the vine - wreathed 
threshold of my door, 
As in old days, to place within my hand 
The gift I would implore, 

Should I with Midas choose the gleam- 
ing gold. 
Or seek great Hera's proffered ample 
power, 
Or would my thought a finer insight 
mould 
In that most fateful hour ? 

That I might ask through taking ear- 
nest heed 
Of deep-heard voices, not some tran- 
sient bliss. 



68 A Choice 

Unmindful of the deathless spirit's need 
In other lives than this, 

But plead to know my King's eternal 
laws, 
To feel within my breast, like mystic 
leaven, 
All pure and subtle influence that draws 
The soul toward God and Heaven : 

To hold my way above life's fret and 
jar. 
In firm allegiance my course to run, 
As, through yon trackless blue, some 
silent star 
Moves round its central sun : 

Yet not removed from life's pervading 
woe. 
Nor shielded from its cruel sense of 
loss. 



A Choice 6g 

But dowered with the alchemy to know 
How grief sublimes from dross : 

And not removed from dark tempta- 
tion's touch, 
But gifted with a strength that would 
not fail, 
Swift to elude the demon's clinging 
clutch 
And mightily prevail ! 

That when some summer in the far-off 
years 
With wandering blooms adorns my 
lonely grave. 
Where fall no more love's unavailing 
tears, 
And unkept grasses wave, 

I may not reck that nevermore my 
name 
Is syllabled in tender utterance here. 



yo A Choice 

That no fond thought of me doth ever 
claim 
The meed of smile or tear : 

Since, flitting like a breath of viewless 
wind, 
Encompassed by a father's constant 
care. 
My peaceful ghost would most securely 
find 
Abiding-place more fair ; 

Old voices hear, sweet as far evening 
bells, 
Break the deep hush upon long silent 
lips, 
Renew for aye, amid the asphodels, 
Its lost companionships ! 




CONSOLATION 

I FT up, tear-blinded one, 
Lift up thine eyes and view, 
Beyond the golden day, 
That sky of wondrous blue 1 
The grave is dark 
And drear below. 
But thou dost know 
Full well, I wis, 
My spirit went that way, 
My body this ? 

Didst thou not hear, dear love, 

But yesterday. 

Two poets sing ? 
One looked into a grave. 
No gracious blossoming 
Of hope and faith made glad 



72 Consolation 

Thy yearning life ; 
He sang, at best, 
Surcease of strife — 
Oblivion's dreamless rest. 

The other, all unskilled 
In mortal minstrelsy. 
Warbled a song that filled, 
With its rapt melody, 
A twilight hour. 
The man looked down, ah me ! 
To earth's dark opening ; 
The bird, with folded wing. 
From trembling perch on high, 
Sang to the boundless sky. 

Come when the summer comes. 
Fond heart, and keep for me. 

In tender ways — 
With velvet sward and blooms — 
This quiet place ; 



Consolation 7^ 

Think of old days, 
But neither weep nor sigh ; 
Lift up a lighted face ! 
Sing to the boundless sky ! 




THE REPLY 

HAT art thou, soul of mine, 
what art thou, pray ? 
I toil to compass thee, but 
fail alway. 

" I am the meeting-place, forevermore, 
Of streams innumerable ; I am that 
deep — 
That cavern dark, wherein they surge 
and roar ; 
I am the pool sequestered, where they 
sleep 
And dream and glint and purl. I am 
that strange 
Twin-windowed room, which fronts, 

at either pale. 
Eternity ; that height thou shalt not 
scale ; 
That depth thou shalt not sound. I 
brook no change, 



The Reply y^ 

I change incessantly ; some changeless 
base 
Of being mine, deep-delved, un- 
sunned, God-wrought ; 
Whereon the human architect doth 
raise, 
Thro' many a wavering mood of 
afterthought, 
His walls and pinnacles. 

Withal my care 
Keeps, tome on tome, in deep- 
shelved rank for thee, 
Each pregnant page of thy long his- 
tory — 
All count of good and ill ingathered 
there. 
Wouldst thou of this eventful room 
the key.? 
Fate granteth not the boon, but do not 

sigh, — 
Thou art the real custodian — not I." 



MEMORIAL DAYi 



END blue above their place of 
rest, 
Thou fair New England sky ; 
With tender grace invest the spot 
Where sleeping patriots lie. 

Let human hearts together vie, 
And grateful homage bring, 

Till round the soldiers' sepulchre 
The holiest memories cling. 

The sacred cause they died to save 

Lives on from age to age, 
Since Freedom's gallant martyrs fill 

Each dark historic page. 

And Sidney on far Zutphen's field. 
And they who slumber here, 

1 Read at the Memorial Day exercises at Waterville, 
Maine, 1876. 



Memorial Day yy 

Demand alike all peoples' praise 
And every patriot's tear. 

Then strew above the soldier's grave, 
The fair flower's nodding bell, 

And dearer to the hero, still, 
The heart's pure immortelle. 

Forget-me-nots for brave young forms 
Who fill the unknown graves. 

Above whose lonely burial mounds 
The southern lily waves. 

And let self-sacrificing deeds 
All souls with faith inspire, 

Kindle upon each altar stone 
Love's ever-living fire, 

Rememb'ring that all saintly lives 

Sleep not beneath the sod. 
But work the Master's mission still 

In the Paradise of God. 



NOW 

HUMBLE Saxon word writ 

here, 
How small thou seem'st ! 
How small that moving point which thou 
Dost symbolize ! 
And yet these eyes 
Were blind indeed, 
Could they not see 
Eternity 
Within thy narrow span decreed ! 

Our morrows and our yesterdays are 
null, 

Of value void. 
They form nor part nor parcel of our lot. 

Thou art our realty. 

We hold in fee 

Thy rich estates. 



Now yg 

If beggars we, 
It will not be 
Thy bounteous hand which seques- 
trates ! 




ONE ANSWER 

" If a man die, shall he live again ? " 

OD gives men sense of seeing, 
And beautiful things to see, 
He grants their eager hstening 
All charm of melody. 

He feeds their taste on fruitage, 
Stored with world-garnering clutch. 

His smooth, rough, fine, rewardeth 
The deftness of their touch ; 

Ten thousand blooms distilling 
For them their priceless scent, 

As ten thousand stars are gleaming 
In yon blue firmament! 

Fond traits of benefaction, 
And a burden-bearing race, 



One Answer 8i 

That wait the glad almsgiving, 
And the shining of the face ! 

Each happy inmate given 

Rich realms to occupy 
In the bounteous earthly dwelling 

With its sun-illumined sky, 

Save one, and that one fairest 

Of all the busy throng, 
In lineament most winsome. 

Most passing sweet in song. 

Who sits and gazes alway. 

With wistful, tear-brimmed eyes. 

Far through those magic casements. 
Far through those throbbing skies. 

The moan of human sorrow — 

A low, sad undertone — 
Unquenched from unwrit ages, 

Floats in from every zone. 



82 One Answer 

She bides, as carved in marble, 
Intent on naught beside, 

She must see her shining uplands. 
She will not be denied. 

Surely no incompleteness 
Dwells in God's love to man, 

In the vast, full-orbed perfectness 
Of his eternal plan. 



THE WARDER 

OD keep my soul to-night! God 

keep my soull " he cried. 
" Twilight's gray shadow falls; 
the never tiring foe 
Prevails. Come near, Strong One, 

speak rest till morning-tide — 
Sweet dream-oblivious rest of boyhood's 
long ago ! 

"The morrow's dawn shall take the 
struggle up again, 

The burning hours be filled from flam- 
ing sun to sun 

With contest grimly waged. Fierce 
Armageddon's plain, 

With all the surging host, shall hold no 
worthier one. 



84 The IVarder 

" But now, that sleep dissolves the mus- 
cles of the will, 

Thrust back, O God, these stealthy 
shapes which menace me, — 

Pity the helpless form of thy drugged 
sentinel, 

Who turns, o'erborne, dear God — to 
thee — who turns — to thee!" 

The tired soldier slept, the tireless foe 

at bay, 
His boyhood sleep that night. Full 

many a fearful ghoul 
Drew nigh, — peered eager in, but 

turned in swift dismay 
To see the mute, dread warder there. 

God kept his soul ! 



A FIRE OF APPLE WOOD 



HE winter sky with stars is filled 
Of every rank and name, 
But chiefly through the frosted 
glass 
I see Orion flame, 
And watch the great sun, Sirius, rise 

Above the patriarch pine 
That lifts its tower of massive gloom 
Across the horizon line. 

How white and cold and still the scene, 
Those gleaming stars below. 

They who have sometime made their 
home 
In North New England know ; 

How rosy-warm the scene within 
They never could divine 



'86 A Fire of Apple IVood 

Who spend their years 'mid tropic heats, 
And languors of the Line. 

I turn me from the bloomless fields, 

And from the birdless tree, 
And from those shivering suns which 
light 

That cold immensity ; 
I draw the shades, leave lamps unlit, 

Make grateful solitude 
Where, leaning close and warm, I watch 

A fire of apple wood. 

Ah ! 't was a noble tree that feeds 

These leaping flames at length ; 
What queenly garb its summer guise ! 

What rugged winter strength ! 
Into its ample breast it drew 

The brooding rain and sun. 
And gave them forth in bloom and fruit, 

A life-long benison. 



A Fire of Apple Wood, 87 

It knew no moody vagaries 

Like men we sometimes see ; 
It ever kept a constant mind, 

My dear old apple-tree ! 
Always near lingering solstice suns 

One saw the great white mound, 
Always with blustering equinox 

The crimson-pa ven ground. 

It saw around its springing youth 

The old dark pine-wood frown. — 
A grandsire of colonial days 

Had brought the sapling down 
From his fond mother-state to grace 

The humble home in Maine, — 
To fruit amid the clearing's smoke 

And ripening corn and grain. 

It had the seedling's flavor wild, — 

When Nature takes in hand 
To make an apple to her mind, 



88 A Fire of Apple Wood 

All grafts that men have planned 
Must yield to her fine alchemy ; 

She, as none other can, 
Marries the wildness in the fruit 

To the wildness in the man. 

I lift the falling brands and heap 

With fragrant logs the fire ; 
The ruddy glow, the sparklet's glint. 

The purring gleams conspire 
With all the gracious fruitage given, 

And all the bounteous bloom, 
To gild, as always generous deeds, 

The darkness of the doom. 

Leap up, thou quivering soul of flame 
And storm the dusky flue. 

Thou warblest some melodious lilt 
E'en with thy last adieu, 

And visions gather of old days, 
When life was in its spring, 



A Fire of Apple Wood 8g 

And all things fair joined hands with 
thee 
In lovely blossoming ! 



Once more around my boyhood home 

The summer twilight broods ; 
Once more the plaintive whip-poor-will 

Calls from the pasture woods ; 
'T is past late milking-time ; the cows, 

Through the cool eventide, 
Are resting where the orchard trees 

Rise up on either side ; 

The bats are flitting ; neighbor lights 

Fade out, but fireflies gleam ; 
I hear a streamlet's whispering flow 

Lapse through the radiant dream ; 
Adown the peaceful gloaming floats. 

O'er slumbering field and dell, 
The murmur-freighted " lin-lan-lone " 

Of a far-off evening bell. 



go A Fire of Apple Wood 

Again my crowning hour of life 

Smiles back across the years ; 
Again the fair Whitsunday morn 

Its olden splendor wears. 
I walk with Miriam in a world 

Complete of loveliness 
As my pleased eyes may hope to see 

In other lives than this. 

She seems the noblest of all girls, 

Gentle, without pretense ; 
The nursery of spiritual blooms 

Rooted in sterling sense. 
We thread the velvet-swarded lane 

And come beneath the shade 
Of my loved apple-tree — the bees 

A happy music made. 



My fire of apple wood burns low. 
The warm transfiguring gloom 



A Fire of Apple Wood gi 

Should gladden Miriam's heart and mine 
In our pleasant keeping-room. 

Is this her hand in mine I hold ? 
Is this her form I see ? 

Or is it but the beauteous wraith 
Of tender memory ? 



IN TENEBRIS 

SHADOW haunted pathway 
this! 
Our Httle Hght 
Shines Hke a tiny taper borne 
Through soundless night. 

But guidance to the pilgrim feet 

Is freely given — 
Sense of a loving Paraclete, 

And hope of Heaven. 

Enough to feel, whene'er we pray. 

With soul sincere, 
For strength to thread an austere way. 

The strength draw near. 

Enough to know whene'er we live 

As one immortal, 
We seem to tread the paths that give 

Upon Life's portal. 




UNEXPECTED GUESTS 

HOSE warmly welcome guests, 
Children of light and air — 
How they come like love and 
life 
To greet us unaware ! 

They brighten like the dawn, 
They blossom like the rose, 

So graciously they steal 

Forth from the deep repose. 

One moment naught did dwell 
In the gates day leaves ajar. 

Save the beauteous loneliness — 
But look — the evening star ! 

Yon elm's March leaflessness 

A tender yearning brings ; 
We recall the wistful gaze. 

And lo — a bluebird sings ! 



g4 Unexpected Guests 

Those tuneful madrigals — 
Like flowers in scented sleep, 

They bloom one knows not where, 
The twilight is so deep. 



FINIS 

OW soon the morning shifts to 
even-song. 
Our heartiest welcomes never 
can prolong 
The summer's stay. 
She folds her purples like a queen de- 
throned : 

Along the way 
Her vanished kindred went she goes 
forlorn. 

Farewell we say 
Musing with full hearts 'mid the 
golden corn. 

How soon youth's springtide shifts to 

snowy age ! 
As some deft reader, turning page by 

page 

Of rare romance, 



g6 Finis 

Reaches the finis, wrought in quaint 
device, 

With swiftest glance, 

So tireless Time reads on without re- 
pose. 

Turning life's volume to its mystic 
close — 

A dreamless trance, 

A flight as viewless as the wind that 
blows. 



